The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time #2)

“I won't hurt you,” Rand called. The man kept on screaming and digging. His hands were bloody, and his scrabblings streaked across dark, congealed smears. This was not his first attempt to dig through the stone with his bare hands.

Rand turned away, relieved that his stomach was already empty. But there was nothing he could do for either of them. “Egwene!”

His light finally reached the end of the cells. The door to Fain's cell stood open, and the cell was empty, but it was the two shapes on the stone in front of the cell that made Rand leap forward and drop to his knees between them.

Egwene and Mat lay sprawled bonelessly, unconscious ... or dead. With a flood of relief he saw their chests rise and fall. There did not seem to be a mark on either of them.

“Egwene? Mat?” Setting the sword down, he shook Egwene gently. “Egwene?” She did not open her eyes. “Moiraine! Egwene's hurt! And Mat!” Mat's breathing sounded labored, and his face was deathly pale. Rand felt almost like crying. It was supposed to hurt me. I named the Dark One. Me!

“Do not move them.” Moiraine did not sound upset, or even surprised.

The chamber was suddenly flooded with light as the two Aes Sedai entered. Each balanced a glowing ball of cool light, floating in the air above her hand.

Liandrin marched straight down the middle of the wide hall, holding her skirts up out of the straw with her free hand, but Moiraine paused to look at the two prisoners before following. “There is nothing to do for the one,” she said, “and the other can wait.”

Liandrin reached Rand first and began to bend toward Egwene, but Moiraine darted in ahead of her and laid her free hand on Egwene's head. Liandrin straightened with a grimace.

“She is not badly hurt,” Moiraine said after a moment. “She was struck here.” She traced an area on the side of Egwene's head, covered by her hair; Rand could see nothing different about it. “That is the only injury she has taken. She will be all right.”

Rand looked from one Aes Sedai to the other. “What about Mat?” Liandrin arched an eyebrow at him and turned to watch Moiraine with a wry expression.

“Be quiet,” Moiraine said. Fingers still lying on the area where she said Egwene had been hit, she closed her eyes. Egwene murmured and stirred, then lay still.

“Is she ...?”

“She is sleeping, Rand. She will be well, but she must sleep.” Moiraine shifted to Mat, but here she only touched him for a moment before drawing back. “This is more serious,” she said softly. She fumbled at Mat's waist, pulling his coat open, and made an angry sound. “The dagger is gone.”

“What dagger?” Liandrin asked.

Voices suddenly came from the outer room, men exclaiming in disgust and anger.

“In here,” Moiraine called. “Bring two litters. Quickly.” Someone in the outer room raised a cry for litters.

“Fain is gone,” Rand said.

The two Aes Sedai looked at him. He could read nothing on their faces. Their eyes glittered in the light.

“So I see,” Moiraine said in a flat voice.

“I told her not to come. I told her he was dangerous.”

“When I came,” Liandrin said in a cold voice, “he was destroying the writing in the outer chamber.”

He shifted uneasily on his knees. The Aes Sedai's eyes seemed alike, now. Measuring and weighing him, cool and terrible.

“It — it was filth,” he said. “Just filth.” They still looked at him, not speaking. “You don't think I ... Moiraine, you can't think I had anything to do with — with what happened out there.” Light, did I? I named the Dark One.

She did not answer, and he felt a chill that was not lessened by men rushing in with torches and lamps. Moiraine and Liandrin let their glowing balls wink out. The lamps and torches did not give as much light; shadows sprang up in the depths of the cells. Men with litters hurried to the figures lying on the floor. Ingtar led them. His topknot almost quivered with anger, and he looked eager to find something on which to use his sword.

“So the Darkfriend is gone, too,” he growled. “Well, it's the least of what has happened this night.”

“The least even here,” Moiraine said sharply. She directed the men putting Egwene and Mat on the litters. “The girl is to be taken to her room. She needs a woman to watch in case she wakes in the night. She may be frightened, but more than anything else she needs sleep, now. The boy ...” She touched Mat as two men lifted his litter, and pulled her hand back quickly. “Take him to the Amyrlin Seat's chambers. Find the Amyrlin wherever she is, and tell her he is there. Tell her his name is Matrim Cauthon. I will join her as soon as I am able.”

“The Amyrlin!” Liandrin exclaimed. “You think to have the Amyrlin as Healer for your—your pet? You are mad, Moiraine.”

“The Amyrlin Seat,” Moiraine said calmly, “does not share your Red Ajah prejudices, Liandrin. She will Heal a man without need of a special use for him. Go ahead,” she told the litter bearers.

Liandrin watched them leave, Moiraine and the men carrying Mat and Egwene, then turned to stare at Rand. He tried to ignore her. He concentrated on scabbarding his sword and brushing off the straw that clung to his shirt and breeches. When he raised his head, though, she was still studying him, her face as blank as ice. Saying nothing, she turned to consider the other men thoughtfully. One held the body of the hanged man up while another worked to unfasten the belt. Ingtar and the others waited respectfully. With a last glance at Rand, she left, head held like a queen.

“A hard woman,” Ingtar muttered, then seemed surprised that he had spoken. “What happened here, Rand al'Thor?”

Rand shook his head. “I don't know, except that Fain escaped somehow. And hurt Egwene and Mat doing it. I saw the guardroom” — he shuddered — “but in here... Whatever it was, Ingtar, it scared that fellow bad enough that he hung himself. I think the other one's gone mad from seeing it.”

“We are all going mad tonight.”

“The Fade ... you killed it?”

“No!” Ingtar slammed his sword into its sheath; the hilt stuck up above his right shoulder. He seemed angry and ashamed at the same time. “It's out of the keep by now, along with the rest of what we could not kill.”

“At least you're alive, Ingtar. That Fad